Caa stats out for September
Overall very good on Spanish routes, USA routes not looking too good

Passing through the airport on Sunday afternoon, it was insisted upon that I placed my 10" tablet in the box by itself, new rules she asserted. When did these new rules come in as I have not had that request before and it certainly didn't apply coming through Birmingham last night?

Came back from SWF recently on a fully booked flight, outbound I'd say about 80%. The figures aren't great but we must remember the route started only in July, three months in only. I daresay the reduction of a frequency for next summer will help massively, it really is a leisure driven route.

Place your 10"where? Lol

Those are not new rules, it's been the norm for tablets/laptops to be placed in a separate tray for a long time.

As GAZMO mentioned above, CAA September stats are out. Here are a few points of interest;

Growth of 9.6% over Sept '16 - end of 26 months of double digit growth. Rolling passenger figure is 5,831,624 (+19%)

Only minor growth on domestic routes. Large decrease in a couple of routes though: BHX (-14%), GLA (-28%)

Strong growth on all French routes - BOD (+522%), CDG (+19%), NCE (+33%) - reversal of trend as CDG has been in decline for several years.

Double digit growth on nearly all Spanish and Portuguese routes.

Some good news from Wizz Air;
VNO (+16%) due to the upgrade to the A321.

Ryanair's exclusive Polish routes are doing quite well, but WRO (and KRK) may start to see a boost in pax given KTW has been axed.
GDN (85%), WMI (82%), WRO (76%)

Mixed picture for Ryanair routes started last September;
SXF down 10% on Sept '16 (LF 81%--->73%)
BGY up 9% on Sept '16 (LF 78%--->85%)

US routes performed extremely poorly in September, with more than half of all seats empty on both routes: SWF (49%), PVD (39%)

I have never been asked to put my tablet in a tray on its own. Yes, not to be covered by other items in the same tray, that I understand, but in a tray on its own? That was not the rule in Birmingham last night nor on many occasions at Bfs either.

I've noticed staff in small airports sometimes make rules of their own.

I guess the main objective is for item to be clearly viable.

Not that I pay much attention, I have generally been asked to have a separate tray.

Its differently not something new.

I've been asked to place all electronics - laptop, phone, tablet - into a separate tray at a range of airports, but then on other occasions at these same airports they're happy enough to mix electronics and non electronics as long as the electronics are at the top. It's not just smaller airports, it's the likes of LHR, MAN, BRU, AMS where you'd think they'd have set rules.

They have set rules when it suits. As far as I can see, a lot of "policy or rules" are made up on the hoof, an excuse to get out of a situation. The more I see the less confidence I have. I think a lot of what is done is just to be seen to be re-assuring the public. If scanners are that good, why random searches and full body scanners?

Belfast isnt a small airport owen

The dept for transport were in yesterday, unless they specified it or something

To be fair to our young friend Owen he only said 'small airports' he may not have been inferring that BFS was a small airport. The point he was probably making was that he had seen it in 'small airports'.

That's how it came across to me anyway:-)

Yes that's right. (Not sure what my age has to do with anything, I hope you aren't invalidating my opinion).

As someone who travels through Gatwick/Stansted on a regular basis BFS is a small regional airport. You need 15 million+ to be a medium size airport.

3 Daily Stansted service from 1st March 2018 with Ryanair!

Almost same times as the Gatwick services. So looks like a 3rd based aircraft for S18!

Showing on the app but not bookable yet.

Great news!

Praise the lord! What i've been looking for, for years.

It is now bookable, it won't keep an aircraft busy so is there more to come?

Doesn't easyJet fly that route?

I detest Easyjet.